Iran's Bushehr to miss launch date-Russian builder

MOSCOW, Mar 12 (Reuters) Russia will not deliver nuclear fuel as planned this month to Iran's Bushehr power station, which will now miss its September launch date, the Russian firm building the plant said today.

''The lack of financing from the Iranian side means that Atomstroiexport did not receive payments for two months,'' Irina Yesipova, a spokeswoman for Russian state-owned contractor said by telephone.

''This means the timeframe has been moved and so the launch cannot happen in September -- we simply cannot do it. If we can't launch the station in September then we cannot deliver the fuel according to the old timetable either.'' Moscow and Tehran have been bickering publicly over what Russia says are tens of millions of dollars in delayed payments for its work on Bushehr, Iran's first nuclear power station.

Iran denies it has missed payments on the plant, a sensitive project as Tehran has come under pressure from the United States and the European Union over its nuclear ambitions.

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